In Indian tradition, music is a combination of three separate art forms:
1. Singing
2. Playing and
3. Dancing

These art forms are learned and performed through Raag and Taal. ‘Raag’ is the dictator of melody and the ‘Taal’ is the dictator of Rhythm. In addition, melody is the product of sound and the rhythm is product of time. Therefore, ‘the music is the art of manipulating the ‘sound’ through ‘time’.

The time affects music in two different ways. First through rhythm is obvious. However, the time is also at work producing the musical sounds that are useful in melody. The universe is full of sounds, but every sound is not musical.

Therefore, the next question is, what is a musical sound?
Each sound can have two segments:


1. The strike and
2. The resonance

In Hindi, these are known as ‘Aghaat’ and ‘Kampan.’ The strike is not a musical sound, but its resonance is. Let’s explore that further. When an object is hit, the first movement it creates in the air is not musical. After the initial strike, the object either will resonate at a fixed frequency or will stand still. If the object creates a tone at a fixed frequency, that tone can be useful in music. Without that resonance the sound will be nothing more than a ‘tick.’

In Sanskrit, these are known as ‘RaNit’ and ‘AnuraNit.’ The ‘AnuraNit’ is the mother of Sharuties.

Now the question is, how long this resonance has to be?
Musically speaking, it has to be long enough so our brain can register it as a musical sound. With the damper on, you can run your hand on a piano keyboard as fast as you can and brain still registers the pitches. Therefore, the length has to be in mere milliseconds. Nowadays if you use a digital audio editor, keep cutting a wave file of a single note, eventually it loses its tone. At that point, it becomes an unmusical ‘strike’ or a click. All those who work with digital editors know that there is an annoying ‘tick’ hidden in the beginning of every pleasant sound. The minimum length of a note varies with the frequency. Naturally, higher the frequency, sooner the note is detected.

The sages of music knew these things without the help of DAWs thousands of years ago.

When more than one frequency is present in the air, they interact with each other. Their vibrations overlap. The sound changes. Some frequencies compliment each other and others do not. The intervals of notes in an octave are directly related to their power to influence the other frequencies.

The enlightened ones have recognized this effect equally all around the world. One way or the other, they set up the notes that share similar frequencies. In India, the practice of setting up the note intervals was based on Sharuties. We will start to explore the ‘Sharuti System’ in the next post.

sangtar.com > Music Theory > Advanced Theory

Somewhere between 3000 and 6000 years ago, an Indian sage Bharat Muni, wrote a book about the performing arts and forever tied the stage, dance and music together. The book is called ‘Natyashastar’ (Natya = performing Arts, Shastar = Science). It is said that the Brahma himself taught Bharat the secrets of performing arts and asked him to spread the knowledge in the world.

The book became the most important source in the development of art of music throughout the world. At that time, India was an important destination for knowledge seekers and travelers. Artists from all over the world went to Indian Ashrams and learned the secrets of Natyashastar. The seven main notes of music in Indian, Chinese, Persian and European music are not just a coincidence, we have to thank Bharat Muni for it. He proved that the note intervals are not arbitrary but (should) have a relation to the root.

Natayshastar is the first available source in the history of our civilization that explains the true nature of harmonics. This knowledge eventually arrived in Europe and a couple of millennia later, Pythagoras used some of Bharat Muni’s techniques to explain the musical phenomenon thorough math and physics. Unlike Bharat Muni, Pythagorus established a scale based on perfect fifths. I read somewhere that at Pythagoras’ time, the consonant of third was not known to Europeans. Yet it was a major part of Bharat’s scale. Bharat established his scale based on three types of harmonics:

Perfect fifth or 3/2,
Perfect fourth or 4/3 and
Perfect third or 5/4.

We will continue discussing these concepts in detail in other posts. Here I would like to give you a simple example of Bharat Muni’s Shudh (pure) Suptak on a Swar Mandal or a Harpsichord:
1. Establish Sa
2. Establish Pa with Sa-Pa (3/2, perfect fifth or Sa-Pa) relation
3. Establish Ma with Sa-Ma (4/3, perfect fourth or Sa-Ma) relation
4. Establish N with M-N (4/3, perfect fourth or Sa-Ma) relation
5. Establish Ga with Ni-Ga Avrohagatic (3/2, perfect fourth or Sa-Ma in descending) relation
6. Establish Dha with Ma-Dha (5/4, perfect third or Ma-Dha) relation
7. Establish Re with Re-Dha Avrohagatic (3/2, perfect fourth or Sa-Ma in descending) relation
8. Establish upper Sa with Pa-Sa (4/3, perfect fourth or Sa-Ma) relation

Compared with modern natural scales, Bharat’s Ga and Ni are komal (flat). Bharat used only nine notes in his music. The above seven are the pure notes and the following two are the Vikrats (moved):
1. Modern shudh Ga (natural third) or Bharat’s Antar Ga (Gandhar) = Sa- Ga (5/4, perfect third or Ma-Dha) relation
2. Modern shudh Ni (natural seventh) or Bharat’s kakali Ni (Nishad) = Pa-Ni (5/4, perfect third or Ma-Dha) relation

Bharat established his music system based on Gram and Moorshana. Gram is the system of establishing the interval of notes, where Moorshana is the system of making parent scales. The above Shudh scale is Bharat’s Shadaj Gram (the Gram of Sa).

sangtar.com > Music Theory > Advanced Theory

You may have read somewhere on this site that Indian Natural Scale is identical to Western Natural Scale.

tone-tone-semitone-tone-tone-tone-semitone

Now, as we discuss the advance theory of music, we have to find the true ‘Natural Scale’. There is no standard Western Natural Scale, so the comparison makes no practical sense. Although, if one does not wish to look into the soul of music, the comparison and the term itself (natural scale) need no further explanation.

Physics of music is a weird phenomenon. For centuries, musician tuned their instruments to each other. What they perceived natural, was natural. Without knowing the frequncies of various notes, everything was naturally in-tune. Now, when we are trying to tie the music to a fixed octave, the natural scale is mere a term. There is nothing natural about any scale played on an electronic keyboard or piano.

Music is an audible art, based on what we hear. To our ears, perfect harmonics sound pleasing. Thus the ancient musical scales were based on perfect harmonics. There are many ways to construct a harmonic scale. Although by doing so, based on the composition, sometimes a few temporary or permanent interval adjustments are required. That is what music is all about. A professional composer or performer knows how to make his composition sound ‘just right’.

Generally speaking, a scale based on ‘just intonation’ is a natural scale. The notes in this scale are established by multiplying the base note’s value with the following harmonic intervals:

Unison= 1 (starting note)
Major 2nd=9/8
Major 3rd=5/4
Perfect 4th=4/3
Perfect 5th=3/2
Major 6th=5/3
Major 7th=15/8
Octave=2

If a piano is tuned according to the above ratios starting from the middle ‘C’, and one wishes to play D major, the intervals will not work. Having said that however, you can change the ‘keynotes’ in C major to get seven different scales, and they all are perfectly natural (more on this later).

We will slowly explore the physics of music. The point is not to remember the frequencies of notes, the point is to understand the natural musical intervals. Indian musicologists explored these phenomenon long before the rest of world. Around 2000BC, The Indian scales based on harmonics had already established and explained in depth.

Nowadays, the natural scale is not derived from harmonics. It is derived from ‘the twelfth root of two’, which has a value of 1.059463 (approx). When this number is multiplied 12 times, the answer is “2”, that is the value of our octave notes (See the list above, the last ratio is 2:1). This system ignores all other harmonics to get a perfect octave. 12 notes of an octave are placed on equal intervals. Although, the values you get through this system are around the desired values, but these are not perfect. This system of dividing a scale into 12 equal intervals is called an “Equal Temperament Scale.”

A violin player cannot play this scale. Only a tuner can achieve these tunings. Humans (trained) naturally play a ‘just intonation’ scale. Yet many musicians think that ‘just intonation’ scales are outdated. Have a look at how one “music wizard” explains the ‘just intonation’ scale in ‘Google Answers’:

“The archaic natural scale uses whole number ratios multiplied by the base note of the octave to achieve the frequency of the other notes. This is an imperfect or dissonant method of composing scales and usually does not sound right.” Perhaps he is a DJ.

If you are interested in reading more about physics of music, the following website has a lot of correct information: Physics of music

sangtar.com > Music Theory > Advanced Theory